


shut up, i love you (you're my best friend)

by octoberfeeling



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: M/M, and self-indulgent, did i write in a scene that basically feels dragged out of a skam s3 remake? yes. do i care? no., it's just soft, roah, tw: ed/food anxiety
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2019-12-11
Packaged: 2021-02-17 22:22:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21750667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/octoberfeeling/pseuds/octoberfeeling
Summary: sometimes when anxiety sets you shaking, it takes manicures and a movie night to make things right again.
Relationships: Noah Czerny/Ronan Lynch
Comments: 3
Kudos: 31





	shut up, i love you (you're my best friend)

**Author's Note:**

> (title is from pink skies by lany)

“That was supposed to take five minutes, baby,” Ronan said, ever-so-slightly begrudgingly as he set a shopping bag down on the floor of their ridiculously tiny apartment.

“I knoooowwww, but there were too many colors to choose from!”

“And yet, you went with the one I knew you would the whole time.”

They had just been on a Target run, supposedly for the sole purpose of Noah replacing his purple shampoo (the platinum hair thing - it came with an intense upkeep regimen). It really was only meant to take five minutes. But it’s Target. So like, duh. Also the nail polish lives dangerously close to the shampoo and such, so it was a natural next stop. 

The stop just took a while.

“Yeah, you clearly know me too well. We’re gonna have to talk about tha--” he was interrupted by Ronan’s lips on his own, a kiss so quick and soft that he wouldn’t have registered it at all, had it not been used as a tactic to make him stop talking. The warmth was gone too soon, and Noah wanted it back. He knew how to get it back. He pouted his lower lip and made a  _ huff _ sound, softened his eyebrows and made the puppy eyes that were toeing the line between sweet and Extra, and it worked like a charm. Just like every other time.

Ronan was back, closer this time, sweeping him into a tight embrace and twirling him around, kissing him hard between bursts of laughter.

Noah had decided shortly after meeting Ronan that laughing kisses were the best kind. Laughing kisses made all of the edges of the world go soft and yellow.

Having been set back on his feet, Noah clasped both of Ronan’s hands in his own, lacing their fingers together, and continued to pepper his face with playful pecks. Ronan laughed again, softer this time, and pushed him backward gently, staring at him in the intense way only a Lynch can do, melting him down to his very core. Their fingers stayed laced together between them, but after a moment of this fierce and silent affection, a look of gentle concern overtook Ronan’s features.

“Hey, when did you last eat?” Noah hadn’t realized his hands were shaking.

He didn’t need long to think about it before realizing that he hadn’t eaten since breakfast, around ten o’clock that morning. Twelve hours ago. His face must have shown his anxiety at admitting this realization to Ronan, because Ronan almost immediately rephrased the question: “Noah, has it been more than five hours since you last ate something?”

Eyes to the floor, Noah nodded. Ronan was having none of that, however. He lifted Noah’s chin with one hand so their eyes were level, held the contact for half a second, then kissed him once more, hard, before doing a full-on twirl to face the kitchen, with all the grace that would have been required of a child in Irish dancing lessons. (Yes, that happened.)

***

About one hour and two grilled cheeses later, the two of them lay face-to-face on their bed, Noah’s feet up by the pillows and Ronan’s hanging off the end. Noah lazily carded his fingers through the annoyingly beautiful dark curls that Ronan had finally agreed to grow out. A mellowed-out version of Ronan’s typical EDM still played softly from the speaker in the kitchen, where dishes would await them in the morning.

Even though they had eaten, Noah’s hands still shook slightly. Anxiety always followed the realization that he had forgotten to eat again. Ronan noticed. Ronan always noticed.

“I have an idea,” he whispered. “Why don’t we watch that movie you’re always trying to get me to watch with you - which one is it again?”

Noah rolled his eyes. “As if you don’t know. Pride & Prejudice, 2005, Keira Knightley, Matthew McFadyen.”

“Right. That one. Anyway, let’s watch that, and I’ll paint your nails for you with the new color you just took an hour to pick out.”

“Okay, one,” Noah poked Ronan’s nose in self-defense, “it did  _ not _ take an hour. And two! As much as I love you for finally agreeing to watch Pride & Prejudice with me, you have to  _ focus _ when we watch that, so you can’t be painting my nails. But I really want you to do that. So. I vote we watch something you’ve already seen about eight thousand times.”

“And what would that be?”

“I think you know what film I’m referring to, babe.”

Ronan got up to turn off the music and grab his laptop and the Target bag, and Noah flailed himself into an upright position better suited to movie-watching and nail-painting. When Ronan sat back down, he set up the laptop at the foot of the bed and hit play on The Princess Diaries.

They sat facing one another and Ronan twisted the top off the bottle of nail polish as Krystal Harris sang the first few lines of Super Girl. He took one of Noah’s hands in his, but stopped before touching the brush to the first nail.

“Wait. I’ve only ever painted my own nails. This is going to go very poorly if we’re facing this way.”

“Well how do we--”

“Hold on, I have an idea.” Ronan handed the polish to Noah and swung his legs around so that he sat behind him, then put one hand on either side of his ribs to indicate that he should rotate himself and lean back into Ronan’s chest.

“There, now it’s like your hands are my hands.”

“Did you mean for that to sound so fucking romantic?”

Ronan placed a wickedly soft kiss into the crook of Noah’s neck and left his lips there as he whispered, “Maybe.”

Noah shivered. Ronan felt this, of course. 

“Just focus on the movie and relax, baby. Polish, please.”

Noah handed over his chosen polish, perfectly purple with just the right amount of glitter, and settled deeper into what he had very recently decided was the best possible position in which to get a manicure from your boyfriend. Ronan carefully and gently swept the brush over each of Noah’s nails, and between each of the three coats he applied, pressed gentle kisses into Noah’s neck, spine, hairline.

Noah’s eyes were closed and the movie was half over and all but forgotten by the time his nails were finished and dry.

“Hey,” whispered Ronan directly into Noah’s ear, “your hands have stopped shaking.”

“Hmmmm,” was Noah’s only response.

Ronan jabbed his fingers into Noah’s sides just enough to make him jump and said, “Hey, sleepyhead. Your hands are steady. That means it’s my turn.”

Noah laughed, breathy and sleepy, and replied, “Go get the black polish, then.”

“Nah, I think I wanna match this time. Glitter me up, baby.” 

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading!!!! i appreciate you endlessly <3  
> comments make me the happiest, so if you feel like leaving one uhhh please do thank you


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